Could you check this over

Fragment of a discussion from User talk:Rua

Drat, I totally knew that! Also, for the *-mn̥ entry. It seems to me that *-h₂ with and abstract t-stem may also form the collective noun as in -mentum and -μᾰ (-ma). Am I way off base on this one?

JohnC520:54, 18 February 2015

I don't actually know, but it does seem at least somewhat plausible that those two suffixes are related. Of course there's still the question of why the nominative has -ma and not -maton, and why the Latin suffix has a thematic stem while the Greek suffix is athematic (the Greek presumably reflects earlier -mn̥t-, the Latin reflects -mn̥to-m).

CodeCat21:12, 18 February 2015

In both cases I believe it was reanalysis.

  • For -mentum, there are examples like armentum, whose earlier form (armenta) is 1st declension. This would then have been reanalyzed as the neuter plural.
  • Similarly, I suspect the that -μᾰ was suppletive (*-mn̥, *-mn̥th₂) and the t-stem crept back into all the singular forms except the nominative singular.

This may just be idle rambling from having looked at these too long, but it seems plausible to me.

JohnC521:54, 18 February 2015

For me, the simplest explanation for the Greek form is just as an athematic -mn̥t-. Greek regularly loses final -t, so in the nominative the result would be -mn̥t > -mat > -ma or -mn̥t > -mn̥ > -ma (both orders are possible and give the same result). In the other forms, the -t- was not final, so it was retained. I see no reason to involve suppletion, unless I am missing something.

CodeCat22:01, 18 February 2015

No, you've probably not missed anything. I'm probably overthinking this. I definitely have seen the theory that -menta > -mentum; though, now I cannot seem to find it now. Would you say, however, that it is fair to categorize -mentum and -μᾰ as abstract t-stem derivatives of *-mn̥?

JohnC522:06, 18 February 2015

I suppose so, although I don't know what abstract t-stems are, exactly.

CodeCat22:08, 18 February 2015

Search for "t-stem" it on this page. They would also give forms such as:

JohnC522:25, 18 February 2015